“Lord Aldaran,” said Gabriel Lanart-Hastur, “I will have your sword, if you please.”
“I? I have done nothing—”
“None the less,” Gabirel said, evenly, “you were once among those who sought to bring Sharra among us. Your sword, sir.” Half a dozen guards, with swords at the ready, moved in on him, and Beltran drew a long breath, looking from guard to guard and evidently calculating his chances; then he shrugged and handed his sword, hilt first, to Gabriel.
“Take him to the Aldaran quarters,” said Gabriel, “and make certain that he does not leave them for any reason whatever, nor on any pretext, until the Regent has spoken with him and satisfied himself of his innocence. Make sure that he has no—” he hesitated, “unauthorized visitors.”
The Prince. I must see what has happened to Derik. Even though he was not in the ballroom, if his shields were down— where, in the name of all the Gods, did Merryl take him?
Regis hurried up the stairs, racing through the long corridors, hallways. In the Elhalyn suite lights were blazing, and he heard a high shrill wailing. He knew, then, that he had come too late. In the main room, Derik was lying half on, half off a divan; Merryl, beside him, was flung across his body as if he had tried, at the last moment, to shield his friend and lord from some unseen menace. He was sobbing; but Derik was motionless and when Regis touched him, already cold. The wailing came from an old woman who had been Derik’s nurse when he was little, and had cared for her sickly charge ever since. Regis looked down sorrowfully at the young man’s body.
Merryl stood up, trying to check his tears. He said, “I don’t know—suddenly he cried out as if he were fighting something away, and fell like this…”
“Was it you, Merryl, who thought it funny to make the prince drunk tonight?”
“Drunk?” Merryl looked up at him in bewilderment. “He was not drunk—he had nothing but some drink made of mixed fruits, so sweet that I could not touch it! He was not—” then comprehension rushed over his face and he stared, only beginning to realize the truth. “Then that was why—Dom Regis, did someone meddle with that drink out of malice?”
“Their malice was worse than they knew,” Regis said grimly, wondering afresh who had played that cruel trick. Lerrys, perhaps, hoping Derik would make a drunken spectacle of himself before Comyn and Terran guests—to re-emphasize that the Domain of Elhalyn was in incompetent hands? If so, he had overreached himself and done murder. Not that Lerrys would have dirtied his hands in doing it himself, but a judicious bribe to one of the dozens of waiters and serving-folk, and it would be done. “If Derik’s shields had been halfway normal, he would have fought, and perhaps conquered, as I did, and Lew—”
Merryl was weeping now, unashamed. Regis had always believed that Merryl had hung around and flattered the prince for his own advantage; now he realized that the youngster had genuinely cared for the prince. And Regis must break more evil news to him.
“I am sorry to have to tell you this—Linnell is dead, too.”
“Little Linnie?” Merryl wiped his eyes, but he looked stunned and grieved. “It doesn’t seem possible. They were both so happy tonight—what happened, Regis?”
Regis found he could hardly speak the name. “The Castle was invaded. Someone tried to summon—” he forced his lips to pronounce the name but it came out only a whisper of horror; the Form of Fire was too new in his mind. “Sharra.”
Merryl said, his voice hard and venomous, “This is the doing of that Alton bastard! I swear I will kill him!”
“You’ll do no such thing,” Regis said. “The—invaders— Kadarin and his crew—were trying to lure Lew back to them, and he fought and was—was wounded.” Again he remembered the blood streaming down Lew’s arm from the wound he himself had given him; but he had no regrets. Something like that had been necessary to bring Lew to himself, to gather his forces so that he might resist Sharra.
I seem to have some power over the Form of Fire. But without Lew I could do nothing.
“Merryl, I must go and tell my grandfather about Prince Derik. You can do nothing more for him now, lad,” he added compassionately, and it did not seem at all strange to call Merryl “lad,” though Merryl was only a year or two younger than himself, “You should go to your sisters.”
“I am not Head of the Domain,” said Merryl, “They will have no use for me.”… abruptly awe swept over his face and he knelt.
“Prince Derik is dead. May your reign be long, Prince Regis of Hastur and Elhalyn!”
“Zandru’s hells!” Regis whispered. So swiftly had everything happened that he had not even realized; what he had always feared had come upon him. Derik had died, young and childless, and he himself, Regis, was nearest the throne. All the implications struck him dumb; he was now superior in rank even to his grandfather, for there was now no reason for a Regency. I am Lord of the Comyn. I, Regis Hastur.
He covered his face with his hands. It was simply too much to take in, and suddenly he realized that the battle with Sharra had left him drained and exhausted, far more than he realized. He thought he would fall to the ground; his knees would not hold him upright. And I am not yet accustomed to the laran I used this night. I used it to free Lew from Sharra, not knowing how or why. Lord of Light! Where will this end?
He said, faltering, searching for words, “Go and—and seek for Lord Hastur, Merryl; I must tell him of Derik’s death—” and some part of him wanted to hide, to run away like a child, for once his grandfather knew this, the process would be inexorable, would roll over him and crush him like one of the great earth-moving machines he had seen on the Terran spaceport. I to rule the Comyn?
“Let me cover him first,” said Merryl. He looked down again at the dead body of the prince; bent and kissed him on the forehead, then took off his own cloak and laid it gently over Derik, covering his face; tucked it around him as if he were comforting a little child who slept. He said, his voice unsteady, “There was more to Derik than most people ever knew,” and Regis thought Derik could have had a worse epitaph.
So many deaths! Lord of Light, where will this end? Marius Alton. Linnell. Derik. Will Sharra reach out and destroy all that is left of the Comyn?
Merryl said, “I am at your orders, my prince,” and went.
By the time the red sun rose over Comyn Castle on that morning after Festival, Derik and Linnell lay side by side in the Chapel of Comyn Castle, together in death as in their lives; Danvan Hastur had locked on their arms the copper marriage bracelets, the catenas they would have worn in just a few days more. Regis felt a poignant sorrow; they were both so young, and they would have been King and Queen of the Comyn. It would have been more just to give Derik the crown he had been denied so long.
I do not want it. But I have never been asked what I want.
The death of Derik, and the accession of Regis to the crown, had been proclaimed in Thendara, but the coronation itself would not take place for some time, and Regis was glad for that. He needed some time to assimilate what had happened.
I am Lord of the Comyn—whatever that may mean in these days of destruction!
“You must name Councillors,” his grandfather had told him; almost the first thing he said, and Regis’s first thought had been: I wish Kennard were alive.
Danvan Hastur was not a powerful telepath, but he had picked that up, He said gently, “So do I, my boy, but somehow you must manage without him. The strongest man within the Comyn is Lord Ardais, and he has always been your friend; he was your cadet-master in the Guards. If you are wise, lad, you will make certain that he is named as one of your first advisers.”
Yes, Regis thought. I suppose Dyan is my friend. I would rather have him friend than enemy, at least. He said something like this to Danilo when they were alone, adding “I hope you will not mind—being paxman to a prince, Dani?”
Ten days ago Danilo would have passed this off with a flippant joke. Now he only looked at Regis seriously and said, “You know that I will do all I can for you. Only I
wish this hadn’t happened. I know you don’t want it.”
“I asked grandfather to take charge of the state funeral for Derik and—and Linnell,” Regis said somberly. “It’s my business to see to the living. I don’t suppose Gabriel and his men have been able to find Kadarin—or Spaceforce, either?”
“No; but there’s rioting in the city, Regis, because Spaceforce has come over on the Darkovan side, searching,” said Danilo. “If you don’t order them out, there’s going to be a civil war.”
“The important thing is to find Kadarin,” Regis protested, but Danilo shook his head. “The important thing, just now, is peace in Thendara, Regis, and you know it as well as I do. Tell Lawton to call off his dogs, or Gabriel isn’t going to be able to hold the Guards back. If they’ve made Thendara too hot to hold Kadarin for a few tendays, so much the better— if he can’t poke his nose out into the marketplace without a guardsman or Spaceforce man grabbing him, then we don’t have to worry about him. But we have to get those Terrans out of the Old Town, or, I tell you, there’s going to be war!”
Regis said with a sigh, “It seems to me that we ought to be able to work together, Terran and Darkovan, against a common enemy, as we did over the Trailmen’s fever, last time there was an epidemic. A few Spaceforce men looking for a hunted criminal aren’t hurting anyone in Thendara—”
“But they’re there,” Danilo argued, “and the people of Thendara don’t want them there!”
It still seemed to Regis that the highest priority just now was to catch Kadarin and eliminate the threat that he would try and raise Sharra again. Just the same, he knew that what Danilo said was true.
“I suppose I ought to make it a personal request to the Legate,” he said wearily, “but I have to stay here and settle things among the Comyn. Grandfather—” he broke off, but he knew Danilo followed the words he could not bring himself to say.
Grandfather has aged overnight; I have always known he was very old, but until that Festival Night he had never shown his age.
“Perhaps,” Dani said quietly, “he has borne this burden all these years because he knew Derik could not rule in his place if he gave up the Regency—but now he trusts you to guard the Comyn in his place.”
Regis bowed his head as if this new burden had been piled physically on him, like a heavy weight. I have known all along that this day would come; I have wished that my grandfather did not treat me like a child; and now when he does not, I am afraid to be a grown man in command of myself and others. It was now his decision to make. He said, “Send a message to the Legate, asking him as a personal favor to me—emphasize that, Dani, as a personal favor to me—to withdraw uniformed Spaceforce men from the Old Town, and restrict them to the Trade City. Or better; write it and I’ll sign it, and have it sent by the most prestigious escort you can find.”
Danilo said, with a wavering grin, “We never thought it would come to this when we were together in Nevarsin and I learned to write a better hand than you. Now you can keep me on hand as your private secretary.”
Regis knew what Danilo was trying to say without putting it into words. As Heir to Hastur he had been visible enough, always in the public eye. But he had done his duty to ensure heirs to the Hastur Domain, and for the rest he had told himself, fiercely, I am not the only lover of men in the Domains! But now, as Prince of the Comyn, he would be even more the public representative of the Comyn. Centuries ago, the Hastur-kin had separated the Hastur Domains of Hastur and Elhalyn, allotting to the Elhalyn all the ceremonial and public duties with the crown.
“A crown on a stick, that’s what they want,” he said grimly. “Something they can hang up in the marketplace and bow down to!” He thought, but did not say, that the Domains had effectively been without a King all during the two-and-twenty years of the Regency, ever since the infant Prince Derik was left fatherless, and the Domains had been none the worse for that lack.
“We had better make sure that there are any Domains to rule over,” he said, when the message had been written, “Derik may not have been the only one to die. And whom shall we send with this message?”
“Lerrys?” Danilo suggested. “He knows the Legate personally—”
Regis shook his head. “Lerrys is too much a Terran sympathizer—I’m not sure he’d deliver the message at all,” he said. “Lerrys’s view is that the Terrans have every right to be here since we are a Terran colony. Merryl?”
“Couldn’t trust him to keep his temper,” Danilo replied promptly.
Regis said hesitantly, “I would send Lew Alton; but he was wounded Festival Night—”
And he is personally concerned in this business of Sharra— “I wonder, Danilo; if I asked Lord Ardais to go—”
“I think he would be pleased to carry such a message to the Legate,” Danilo said, “for he knows what it will do to the city, having uniformed Spaceforce about, and he is always eager to keep the people calm.”
“I won’t order him to do it,” said Regis. “I know he does not like to go among Terrans, but he may be willing to go if I ask it personally as Lord Elhalyn—”
And again the tragedy struck him; Derik was older than he was himself, yet Derik had died without so much as a nedestro son to carry on his name. He had loved Linnell and had waited for their marriage, so that Linnell might bear his Heir; and now they were both dead.
And I have never cared so much for any woman. So I have two sons and a daughter, since I had no hesitation in using a woman for that purpose. Gods! What irony!
Yet I shall not share my throne with any woman, at least not for a time, nor until I find one with whom I am content also to share my life.
“I will go and ask Dyan myself,” he said, glancing at the climbing sun, and suddenly aware that he had had no sleep and that he was weary. “He should still be sleeping, but for this he will not mind being wakened.”
But in the Ardais quarters there were only servants, and one of them told Danilo that Lord Ardais had gone out early.
“Do you know where he is?”
“Zandru’s hells, sir, no! Do you think the Lord Ardais tells his comings and goings to the likes of me?”
“Damn! Now I’ll have to hunt all through the Castle for him,” Regis said, wondering whether Dyan had gone to the Guard hall to see if he, an experienced officer, could be of some help to Gabriel, or whether he had left the ballroom earlier on some private errand and was still abed somewhere with a new favorite. If so, he might not know anything of the destruction that had raged in the Comyn!
Had it been only the day before that he had discussed this very possibility—sending Spaceforce into the Old Town of Thendara to find Kadarin? He had advised against it then; but Lawton had that authority, and now Kadarin had appeared actually within the Comyn Castle, to try and lure Lew Alton back to them… had he any right to keep Lawton from finding this man who was wanted for murder, and other crimes, by both Terran and Darkovan?
“Gabriel may know,” he said, “and there are guardsmen at the doors of the Aldaran suite; they may be able to tell us where Gabriel is—in the Guard Hall, or out hunting for our wanted man!”
The suite of rooms allotted in Comyn Castle to the Aldarans had stood empty ever since Regis could remember; it was in a wing of the Castle which Regis had never knowingly entered before. Two big Guardsmen stood outside the door which was bolted shut on the outside. They saluted Regis, and he greeted them politely.
“Darren, Ruyven—I have to speak with my brother-in-law. Do you know if Dom Gabriel is in the Guard Hall, or if he’s gone into the city? I have to locate Lord Ardais—”
“Oh, I can tell you where the Lord Ardais is, sir,” the Guardsman Ruyven said. “He’s in there, talking to Lord Aldaran.”
Regis frowned and said, “I heard Captain Lanart-Hastur give orders that no one should be allowed to speak with Aldaran—”
“I didn’t hear him say that, sir, I only came on at dawn,” Ruyven said, “and anyhow—” he looked down at his boots, but Regis knew
perfectly well what the man was thinking; was he supposed to give orders to a Lord of Comyn, and, moreover, one who had been his own superior officer for many years? Regis said, “Never mind, then, Ruyven, but you’ll have to let us in to see him, too.”
When Regis was small, he had been curious about the locked, empty Aldaran apartments. As the Guardsman let him in, he noticed that a dank and empty smell still clung about the walls and the embroidered hangings with the Aldaran double-headed eagle. They found Beltran in the main presence-chamber; someone had brought him some breakfast and he was eating porridge and nut-bread from a tray on his lap. Dyan sat at ease in a nearby chair, drinking something hot from a mug.
He looked up curiously at the younger men, but Beltran grinned widely. Regis had forgotten how much alike he and Lew really were, even through Lew’s scars.
“Well, Regis,” he said, “at last we are even; you came as kinsman to my castle and I imprisoned you—and now I come as kinsman to yours, and you imprison me. I suppose it’s only fair you should have your day.”
It was like Beltran, Regis supposed, to put him immediately on the defensive. He said stiffly, “A word with you, if you please, Lord Ardais.” He was not going to discuss Comyn business with Beltran present.
“Lord Aldaran is party to Comyn business,” Dyan reminded them.
“Not this,” Regis said coldly. “Are you aware, Lord Dyan, that Prince Derik died during the night?”
“Good riddance,” said Dyan.
“Kinsman!” Danilo protested, and Dyan turned fiercely on him.
“Zandru’s hells, must you be such a hypocrite? We all know that Derik was a weakling, about as fit to rule as my three-year-old son! Now, perhaps, there will be some force in the Comyn, and we can talk to these Terrans as they deserve!”
Regis said stiffly, “It will be my business now to talk with the Terrans, Lord Dyan. It was for that I came here—I wish you to act as my embassy to them, with a message—”
Dyan interrupted, “There is only one message I will bear to the Terrans, Lord Regis, and you as a Hastur know what that message will be: get out! Off our world, off our planet, and take your Empire along with you!”
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